


Gender, Joss Whedon's Television Shows and The Culture Wars.

by shadowkat67



Category: Angel: the Series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV), Dollhouse, Firefly
Genre: Criticism, Fandom Allusions & Cliches & References, Gen, Gender Issues, Meta, Television
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-07-05
Updated: 2009-07-05
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:54:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22398133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowkat67/pseuds/shadowkat67





	Gender, Joss Whedon's Television Shows and The Culture Wars.

There is a HEAVY theme in Whedon's work about "dirty girls" or anti-misogyny and anti-sexism. His work isn't misogynistic, it is actually pointing out the misogyny in our society and critiquing it. Which actually is one of the things that draws me to Whedon - because Whedon and I have to a degree studied the same film canon - the violent 1940-1970s Western genre beginning with Howard Hawks and John Ford and ending with Sam Peckinpaugh and the guy who did The Good, the Bad and The Ugly. We've also both studied the same violent horror and psychological horror canons - Hitchcock, Kubrick, Hammer, Rami, the guy who did Halloween, the slasher flicks, Robert Wise, amongst others. You can't seriously study these films without picking up on an insisdious sexism and misogyny housed within them. And you can't study Freud and Christian/Judaic/Greek/Celtic/Western mythology without picking up on a similar theme. Once you do, religion becomes a bit indigestible in large doses.

I find Whedon interesting because as far as I can tell he is the only one that I've seen really critiquing it. I'm certain there are others, but I am at this moment unaware of them. The others who have done so, specifically women, have been pushed to the borders. Not that I think Whedon is being taking any more seriously, but he is doing this in a genre and medium that is traditionally misogynistic and sexist in tone. In some respects he even appears to be critiquing this societal viewpoint in a way that offends the very fanbase he seems so eager to please. Chiding them for their worship of gender stereotypes and misogynistic messages - stating that by continuing to endorse such stereotypes and roles, they inadvertently cause other less palatable things to occur as a direct result of those enforced stereotypes or limitation in roles.

People hate change. We have an odd nostalgia for traditional views and role models, believing them to be better because they are what we know. And often confusing this nostalgia with moral values. They are not the same. Whedon through Buffy, Dollhouse, Firefly and other works is attempting to poke holes in that point of view. Which I suspect makes many people uncomfortable.

We don't like to be told for example - that the fact _Star Trek's_ only female character is a supporting role, romantic love interest is endorsing this potentially dangerous stereotype. That Urhura is the traditional female 'fantasy' role - for both men and women. And the fact that in the future world in which Star Trek takes place, where racial conflict no longer exists, gender still remains an issue, women are still perceived solely in their direct relationship to men - sexually or how they affect, support, or concern the men - little more than mothers, sex objects, information gatherers and girlfriends - indeed the weaker sex - to the men. Something to be protected, worshipped, despised or cherished. We see them solely through the male worldview and it is a superimposed male fantasy view at that. It would be one thing if we had a female Sulu, or Kirk or even Bones, but Star Trek in its reboot is still an all boys club, with one female member, who just happens to be a hottie in a hot romance with one of the male leads, while being hit on relentlessly by the other. She is in some respects many a fangurl's fantasy - caught between two hot men, intelligent, giving them whatever they desire, even if it is being unattainable. At the same time, the fanboy's fantasy of the perfect girlfriend. Uhrura serves as a modern poster girl for the paternalistic sexist society in which we live, right up there with Lois Lane, Josephine Baker, and Mary Jane Parker, but not so much Ameila Earheart or Julia Child. This would not be troubling if it were an isolated incident, the only one. But, we see the same thing repeated with Terminator :Salvation, Wolverine - Origins, and well The Dark Knight, not to mention Iron Man, the Transformers, and Public Enemies. The sole romantic comedy, The Proposal - the woman does have the traditional male role - and she is mocked, taken down a few steps, humilated for the benefit of her hunky male assistant who is shown to be the better of the two, the more deserving. But we don't want to see that. Any more than we want to see it in our own fic or writing or how we view the world.

Women are **ONLY** interesting as "mothers" dammit! Or Whores! Or Spinisters! Or Nuns! Or Girlfriends! Women don't get to be firemen and policemen and soliders and Presidents! Yet they do and are, and in some respects, succeed quite well in these roles. Just as men succeed in traditional female roles - as nurturers and mothers and yes, even whores. (Do not misunderstand this as saying that I think motherhood a role that is not worth having, it is a difficult and admirable role, but it is not the only role and not for all of us. Any more than all of us are cut out to be fathers or teachers or firemen or policemen or pilots. I am also not stating that being a secretary, a model, a teacher, a librarian, a nurse, or a clerk is not worthy. They are WORTHY! I am stating that restricting them to a gender or stereotyping them as being strictly female roles is limiting and unnecessary. Men and women should be allowed to do both these roles - and yes, there are men who take on the traditional mother role - nurturer, while the woman is the traditional father role - provider, after a child is born.)

My brother and I are perfect examples - he is the nurturer - the primary care-giver, he is also an excellent teacher. I on the other hand, am not good at nurturing. I don't like to grow things. And am very strategic, somewhat aggressive/assertive, logical, and very analytical. He loved clothes and loves hunting for bargains. I despise it. We are both heterosexual. He is not effeminate. I am not butch. He loves sports, and I love theater. But we do not fit the traditional stereotypical gender roles that the media insists on placing on us. We defy lables. And I think to a degree this is what Joss Whedon is critiquing the desire our society has to split people into easy gender roles. It is contrary to what his more popular contempories such as JJ Abrhams, Russell T. Davies, and Daniel Lindenoff are doing. Which is why he fascinates me as a writer.

It's weird once you become aware of this sexism - you can't switch off your awareness. And part of you misses those days in which you weren't aware or conscious of it. You don't want to know, because knowing makes it difficult to enjoy certain things, like Merlin, or Doctor Who or even the musical 1776, which you tell yourself is contextual and historical and therefore the things that are bugging you irrelevant. You become increasingly aware that because of your gender you are a second-class citizen in the society in which you live, worse others of your own gender, people like yourself, similarly disenfranchised are working to keep this societial view intact, because it fits their view of themselves and makes them feel good and you think if only we could find a happy medium. That it wasn't just one or two sizes fit all. To the extent that their very worldview is ensuring misogyny, sexism and paternalism continue unchallenged. And you begin to wonder if you are too, ensuring this. If there is something you could or should do to change it. But you can't think of anything. And so, you decide to try to ignore these feelings, these worries, or switch it off.

Right now, I think, our society is struggling with what can best be called gender wars. It's not just gay rights, or transgender, or sexual orientation - it goes much deeper than that. And it is not just one country fighting this cultural war, or one person, but all of us at the same time. And like the NY State Senate since its conception, we at times seem to be little more than a bunch of angry voices that no can quite understand or pick out, and nothing seems to really move forward. This is not true. A Lot has moved forward. Women are now allowed to wear pants in the work place. They aren't permitted to wear sexually inappropriate clothing but neither are men. Neither is allowed to wear a mini skirt or halter top. Women are also permitted to become firemen, police, soliders, generals, and run for President. We can vote. We get called for jury duty. We can get news articles published under our own names. We can become construction workers and engineers and contract administrators. We can take on traditional male roles, if we desire. And men can become nurses, secretaries, home care specialists, kindergarten teachers, stay-at-home moms or dads, and write fashion articles. Men and women can have children, both can choose to work, or one can and the other stay home - regardless of gender. While gender does define us in some respects, it no longer limits us to pre-determined roles or models. We are not bound to the models dictated by ancient mythologies or transcribed in ancient and out of date religious text. Well, at least some of us can, many many of us do not and may never have that ability. Antiquated religious text and mythos does dictate how a vast majority of people in our world live.

Assuming you are free from these dictates - this does not mean that you can't choose the traditional role nor that you shouldn't. Just that you now have the choice to do whatever works best for you and your family. And it does not mean that the choice you make is the wrong or right one. It's not about "right" or "wrong" - therein lies the confusion. We are trained to think everything fits into categories of right or wrong, good or evil, black or white, male or female. When about 99% of the time, they don't or so I've discovered. I think it is about power - the power to choose what is best for us as individuals and as a group, a society. As Whedon states in S7 and S5 of Buffy - it's not about right or wrong, it is about power. The soul in the Buffyverse is in some respects a metaphor for "choice" and taking responsibility for those choices.

And, it is also about the realization that what works for an individual is not necessarily against the group as a whole. Giving up a bit of power, often gives us more. By sharing the right to vote with women, men strengthened our society. By sharing the work-place with women, men have leisure time, time to be with their families, more advances in technology and health care were discovered. It's sharing. When one group holds power over another, both groups fall. Both fail. That I think was the message in "Chosen" - or what Whedon was and is attempting to get across in his on-going series Buffy.

It's when Buffy shares her power that she defeats the First. She gives everyone a role. And it's not just in Chosen that she does it, she does it Primeval and The Gift. Even Becoming. She could not defeat these demons on her own. And the gender roles shift. In Chosen the men support the women. Spike supports Buffy, Andrew supports Anya, Xander and Robin Wood support the slayers. And in Primeval - Xander and Giles lend heart and mind to Willow's spirit and Buffy's hands. The message is the needs of the many and the needs of the few are the same, they aren't counter to each other. It's when we attempt to say one is better than the other, that we fail. To succeed we must each let go of some power, compromise, we need to let go just a bit.

Keeping to the old gender roles makes that difficult. It pigeon holes people. Places them in boxes where they cannot breath. This is not to say, Abhrams fantasy vision of _Star Trek_ or his _Alias_ serial with the sexy female spy playing traditional female gender roles to catch her prey is wrong, it is saying that it is limiting. Nor is this to say that enjoying either is endorsing that worldview - because I don't believe it does, I've enjoyed both. I do think that the vision/fantasy needs to be critiqued. That we need to question these limitions, if only in our own writings, our own analysis, and our stories. Expand on it, push the enevelope, as opposed to letting it remain its normal size. And I think doing that is going to be difficult. Because it means retraining our brains, reconditioning ourselves, and how we look at each other and the world around us. It means being criticized and rejected by those who prefer the old way.

This is already happening to a degree, bit by evolutionary bit with our children and our children's children. But I think for it to continue, we have to continue to question and evolve our faith, not blindly follow religious or political or cultural leaders like lemmings to the proverbial cliff. And that again I think is not going to be an easy thing to do for any of us. So I ultimately give Whedon credit for continuing to raise the questions, even if they at times feel a bit didatic in tone. Unfortunately, there aren't many women writers getting similar attention - who saying similar things, such as Kim Harrison in her Rachel Morgan series, or Jane Campion in her films or Doris Lessing and Shirly Jackson and countless others. When a women says it, she is considered strident, when a white guy says it is considered more palatable, by both women and men. And that I think is part of the problem.  



End file.
